"Illustrated?" gasped Pitou. He looked round the attic. "Did I
understand you to say 'illustrated'?"

"Well, well," said Tricotrin, "we shall move the beds! And, when the
concierge nods, perhaps we can borrow the palm from the portals. With a
palm and an amiable photographer, an air of splendour is easily arrived
at. I should like a screen--we will raise one from a studio in the rue
Ravignan. Mon Dieu! with a palm and a screen I foresee the most opulent
effects. 'A Corner of the Study'--we can put the screen in front of the
washhand-stand, and litter the table with manuscripts--you will admit
that we have a sufficiency of manuscripts?--no one will know that they
have all been rejected. Also, a painter in the rue Ravignan might lend
us a few of his failures--'Before you go, let me show you my pictures,'
said monsieur Tricotrin: 'I am an ardent collector'!"

In Montmartre the sight of two "types" shifting household gods makes
no sensation--the sails of the remaining windmills still revolve. On
the day that it had its likeness taken, the attic was temporarily
transformed. At least a score of unappreciated masterpieces concealed
the dilapidation of the walls; the broken window was decorated with an
Eastern fabric that had been a cherished "property" of half the
ateliers in Paris; the poet himself--with the palm drooping gracefully
above his head--mused in a massive chair, in which Solomon had been
pronouncing judgment until 12:15, when the poet had called for it. The
appearance of exhaustion observed by admirers of the poet's portrait
was due to the chair's appalling weight. As he staggered under it up
the steps of the passage des Abbesses, the young man had feared he
would expire on the threshold of his fame.

However, the photographer proved as resourceful as could be desired,